Abstract:
Oil markets are facing a perfect storm.
The scissors of supply and demand
are moving against one another,
generating increasing pain on the oil
industry and the political and financial
stability of oil-producing countries.
Global oil demand is dropping due to
the recession induced by the COVID-19
shut down of economic activity and
transport in the most industrialized
countries. Goldman Sachs predicts that
global demand could drop from 100
million barrels per day (mdb) in 2019 to
nearly 80 mdb in 2020.1
If confirmed,
this would be single biggest demand
shock since petroleum started its race
to become the most important energy
source in the world.

Abstract:
On 25 March, one month after Russia registered its first confirmed case of Coronavirus, President Vladimir Putin announced a week of paid national holiday and invited Russians to stay home in a televised address to the nation. Further measures were subsequently introduced to limit the spread of the virus, while authorities prepared emergency plans to safeguard socio-economic conditions in the country. Initiatives included providing a new support package to businesses hit by the pandemic, a monthly bonus to medical personnel and the construction of new hospitals, following the Chinese model. Meanwhile, the constitutional referendum meant to extend Putin’s term limit as president was postponed. Originally scheduled for 22 April, this delay is due to Putin’s concern for public health and the multidimensional impact of the pandemic, a perfect storm involving quarantine measures, declining living standards, inflation and a weakened exchange rate, rising prices and increased job insecurity. Taken together, these challenges could jeopardise the outcome of the referendum. A recent poll conducted by the Levada Center in March highlighted a very slim majority (45 per cent) in favour of Putin’s constitutional amendments.

Institution:
The Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College

Abstract:
Does The US Army in Multi-Domain Operations 2028 lack a clear theory of victory? A comparative analysis of the development of MDO and the historical concepts of Active Defense and AirLand Battle reveals the necessity of greater insight into sources of Russian and Chinese behavior and countering mechanisms, what constitutes effective deterrence, and greater clarity regarding the political will of Allies to assist in this deterrence.

Topic:
Military Strategy, Armed Forces, Military Affairs, Army

Political Geography:
Russia, China, Asia, North America, United States of America

Abstract:
The rise of Asia is the central challenge of Vladimir Putin’s foreign policy, calling into question long-standing assumptions about Russia’s place in the world.
Moscow is now more committed to engagement with the Asia-Pacific than it has ever been. This reflects belated recognition of the region’s critical importance in global affairs.
Russia’s ambition to become a major player in the Asia-Pacific faces considerable hurdles. Overcoming them will depend on larger changes in its foreign policy mindset — an uncertain prospect at best.

Abstract:
Russia’s Syrian campaign has demonstrated the returning challenge the West faces in the underwater domain. Combat operations in Syria have been an opportunity for Russia’s military forces to prove on operations a new generation of capabilities, just as Operation ‘Desert Storm’ in 1991 saw the United States demonstrate its own new generation of military technology. One of the first weapons fired in ‘Desert Storm’ was a Tomahawk sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM), launched on the first day from several surface combatants. Two days later, a Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered attack submarine (SSN) became the first submarine to fire Tomahawk in combat.[1] The USN’s re-roling of its SSNs as primary power projection platforms in the 1990s/early 2000s underlined the shift in Western focus in the underwater battlespace away from the primary Cold War task of anti-submarine warfare (ASW) to counter Soviet naval activity. Simply, the strategic collapse of the Soviet Union saw what was a significant submarine threat disappear almost overnight, and with it – for that moment, at least – the Western requirement for ASW capability.
Today, the underwater threat is back. Since 2008 – which saw both Russian naval forces engaged in the Georgia campaign and the re-emergence of regular deployments by Russian submarines (and surface ships) south of the Greenland-Iceland-UK (GIUK) gap – naval power has been central to Russia’s strategic resurgence.

Abstract:
We will examine how Putin's Russia has accepted the rules of the liberal international order and managed to take advantage of them, enduring the long and difficult post-Soviet transition, in peace and with its integrated territory.

Abstract:
The main objective of this study is to analyze the presence of the Russian Navy in the Black Sea and in the East Mediterranean Sea, taking into account the operations in Syria and the overall strategy employed in this region.

Abstract:
Putin’s foreign policy will remain grounded in long-standing assumptions about Russia, the West, and international order. There will be broad continuity in Russian foreign policy over the course of Vladimir Putin’s current presidential term. Any policy changes will be stylistic, not transformative.
The Kremlin is committed to asserting Russia as a global power, although it will be tactically flexible in pursuing this ambition.
Putin will present different faces to the West: sometimes accommodating, at other times assertive and even confrontational. But there will be no compromise on core principles.

Abstract:
The indictment filed by the United States Justice Department on February 16, 2018 against 13 Russian citizens and three Russian companies regarding attempts to promote the candidacy of Donald Trump for the US presidency, amounting to intervention in the country’s political system, is a phenomenon enabling interference in the “consciousness” of another country

Abstract:
The war scenery in Eastern Ukraine in 2015 showed Kiev in a disadvantageous military position, in its efforts to stop the separatists’ advances in the occupied territories. At the same time, the possibilities that the self-proclaimed authorities of the “Donetsk and Lugansk Popular Republics” would honor the military clauses of the 2014 and 2015 Minsk Agreements were remote. Neither were the authorities in Kiev inclined to honor the political clauses for which they were responsible. This difficult situation led the President of Ukraine to present a proposal for the deployment of a peace -keeping mission under the mandate of the United Nations Security Council. Nevertheless, such an initiative was not given on that occasion, any support or follow -up.